Collaborative Spatial Decision Support Systems Research Articles

Advancing Urban Healthcare Equity Analysis: Integrating Public Participation GIS with Fuzzy Best–Worst Decision-Making

This study provides an innovative collaborative spatial decision support system (SDSS) that aims to ensure an equitable spatial distribution of healthcare services. Evaluating the equality of access to health services across different geographical areas is important, as it requires the analysis of various criteria such as the proximity of health centres and hospitals (HCHs), the quality of services offered, connectivity to primary roads, the availability of public transportation hubs, and the density and distribution patterns of HCHs. This purpose is accomplished via the use of geographic information systems (GIS) and multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) methods. The proposed model includes the weights of the criteria, which are determined through the ordered weighted average (OWA) and evaluated based on their ORness, which ranges from 0 to 1. Furthermore, this model is improved by the best–worst fuzzy method (F-BWM). This approach produces a spatial map that clearly shows the equity of healthcare systems in urban environments. The findings show that the maximum score observed in this study was 0.38% (with an ORness value of 1), whilst the minimum score recorded was 0.28%. In the most severe scenario (ORness = 0), over 70% of the region shows different degrees of fairness, ranging from moderate to suitable and very suitable conditions. Governments and health authorities can use this information strategically to allocate resources and address inequities in access to healthcare facilities.

A collaborative spatial decision support system applied to site selection problems

Nowadays, urban areas face many challenging issues; one of the most demanding is site selection. Strategic site selection issues are typically complex problems that require consideration of multiple alternatives (sites), multiple criteria and multiple decision-makers with conflicting interests, preferences and desires. In this perspective we propose a new decision making framework based on three areas of high importance: multi-agent systems, geographic information system and multiple-criteria decision analysis. These three tools are combined in a manner so that the shortcoming of one tool is complemented by the strength of the others. To assist the decision makers in selecting the compromise alternative from a number of feasible alternatives, the proposed decision support system will be enriched with a protocol of negotiation based on argumentation approach, which allows agents (decision makers) to exchange complex justification positions rather than just simple proposals, this property of argumentation protocols can lead to faster and beneficial agreements to the group.

Collaborative Water Resource Decision Support: Results of a Field Experiment

This article presents results of an empirical study about the use of a group-based geographic information system (GIS), called WaterGroup, developed as a collaborative spatial decision support system. WaterGroup was designed to enable stakeholder groups to participate in the solution of conjunctive water resource administration decision problems being addressed by the Idaho Department of Water Resources in the Boise River Basin of southwestern Idaho. The decision situation, software development, and empirical investigation are described within the context of other research activities/literatures related to group/community/public geographic information systems, helping us sort through the burgeoning terminology of this continually emerging field. We used Enhanced Adaptive Structuration Theory 2 to motivate research questions investigated by way of a field experiment research design. Decision process is characterized in terms of human-computer-human interaction coding. We used a technique called “interaction coding” to compile three streams of data from videotapes as a record of interaction in two stakeholder-oriented decision workshops. Coded data are examined using nonparametric, exploratory sequential data analysis. Additionally, we used questionnaires to gather data regarding participant perceptions of WaterGroup and the decision process. The findings of this study indicate that different technology configurations foster a different balance between analytic and deliberative activities within phases of a conjunctive administration decision process. A low-technology, chauffeur-driven configuration in a phase encourages more deliberation, and a medium-technology, participant-driven configuration in a phase encourages more analysis. We discuss the findings and their implications for group-based GIS decision support. This article will be of interest to researchers involved in group-based GIS decision support software design, in empirical studies of stakeholder group-based decision support, and facilitators desiring to gain deeper insight into field settings involving group-based GIS decision support.

Design Considerations and Evaluation of a Collaborative, Spatio-Temporal Decision Support System

Collaborative spatial decision support systems (C-SDSS) have been used to help groups of stakeholders understand data and search for opportunities at resolving local and regional decision problems in various domains including land use, trans- portation, and water resources. The key issue in designing an effective C-SDSS is the anticipation of user information needs. Knowledge of user information needs can guide system designers in achieving a C-SDSS that fits the decision process. In this paper we present a design approach that is informed by stakeholder concerns, as part of a user needs assessment. The approach is based on the premise that knowing stakeholders’ concerns can help anticipate user information needs and consequently lead to a more usable C-SDSS. We demonstrate the approach with the example of a spatio-temporal decision problem involving conjunctive water administration in the Boise River Basin in southwestern Idaho. The spatial dimension of the decision task involves delineating the areas of conjunctive water administration while the temporal dimension involves selecting the year in which a given area will start to be administered. We show how the elicitation of stakeholder concerns leads to functional specification of a collaborative spatio-temporal decision support system.

Design and Implementation of a Web-Based Collaborative Spatial Decision Support System

The development of collaborative spatial decision support systems presents a host of challenges, ranging from technical to societal and institutional. Resource managers and environmental planners often need to understand the effect of the distributed and uncoordinated land management practices of individual decision-makers, which in the long run causes significant environmental impact. In many cases environmental planning requires collaborative decision-making tools where complex interacting agents with conflicting goals need to work without any prior idea of the counterpart. This paper identifies research issues on the design and implementation of a Web-based collaborative spatial decision making in the specific context of distributed environmental planning. We demonstrate a Web-based Spatial Decision Support System GEO-ELCA (Exploratory Land Use Change Assessment) for typical decision-making tasks by urban or municipal planning agencies where resource managers or stakeholders of different interest groups can express their options for future land use changes and assess the resulting hydrological impacts in a collaborative environment.

Design of Decision Support for Stakeholder-Driven Collaborative Land Valuation

First Nations treaty negotiations and land-claim settlements require the valuation of large areas of land for diverse land uses, including usage which is difficult to quantify in absolute or monetary terms. The authors report an attempt to develop a methodology for seeking consensus on land values for the latter land-use activities, using Gestalt valuation. They offer an alternative to planner-driven land valuation, placing the valuation responsibility instead on stakeholders. The methodology is justified and explained. The authors introduce different types of decision-support information products that can be derived to facilitate consensus building. They summarise experience gained in an evaluation of the proposed methodological procedure, in which university students were used as a sample. They conclude that computing technology has advanced sufficiently to make it reasonably straightforward to collect information about individual stakeholders' land valuations, and that the resultant information can be packaged effectively in a collaborative spatial decision support system to facilitate consensus building. Ongoing research is introduced.

Collaborative spatial decision making in environmental restoration management: an experimental approach

This paper presents the results of an experimental study about the use of collaborative spatial decision support tools to aid environmental restoration management and decision making. Similar, but non-geographic tools were developed and successfully applied in the 1990s for the computerised support of group decision making aimed at solving business problems. Yet, there are significant differences between business applications and spatial applications including environmental management. These differences motivated the study of habitat restoration reported in this paper. The results demonstrate that maps—the most common representation structures of spatial data in geographic information systems—play only a limited support role. Development of new ways to visualise spatial information and novel integrations of maps with analytical tools including multiple criteria decision models may help develop more effective collaborative spatial decision support systems.